Lieutenant Jimmy Cross In Tim O Brien's The Things They Carried
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What’s love got to do with it? A question we’ve heard sung many times and quoted countless occasions. In the story The Things They Carried, First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross pulled his strength from a wishful love. He loved Martha and hoped that she returned his silent love. “They were not love letters, but Lieutenant Cross was hoping” (150) His first description of what Martha looked like, was vague, just that she was a “virgin”. (151) Therefore, it made you wonder was Jimmy in love with Martha just because she was innocent or because of who she was? People allow themselves to love for various reasons.
Besides the necessary items Lieutenant Jimmy Cross was required to carry, he carried letters from a girl named Martha "a junior at Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey". (150) The letters didn't weigh much and he was able to carry them in his rucksack. Who hasn’t been in love at some point? Love will make a man drift off in his thoughts on the endless possibilities he can encounter with the object of his affection. He will wonder what she’s doing and who’s she doing it with. Martha sparked this hope for Jimmy.…show more content… He was in love with Martha and hoped that she loved him in returned. Despite the fact that her letters were recounting her adventures at school with peers and professors, he held on to the hope that she loved him. The letters allowed him to dream and believe that one day Martha would be his girl. "He would imagine romantic camping trips into the White Mountains in New Hampshire. He would sometimes taste the envelope flaps, knowing her tongue had been there." (151). Reading her letters always threw him off kilter, made him feel "a bit distracted", (151) so he would have to put them away and refocus on the tasks at